Transmission of Rabbit Papillomatosis by the Rabbit Tick, Haemaphysalis leporis palustris

Abstract

Rabbit horns occurring on cottontails and on jack rabbits were described by Seton. He reported specimens collected in Oklahoma, Nebraska, and Colorado. Transmission of these tumors was accomplished by Shope, who described them as infectious papilloma. Shope further showed that the causative agent is to be classed as a filtrable virus, and succeeded in transmitting tumors to domestic rabbits. Our first attempts to transmit the infection to domestic rabbits were unsuccessful and we were unable to demonstrate any intracellular structures which might be termed inclusion bodies. Subsequently we succeeded in transmitting the tumors to cottontail rabbits, domestic rabbits, and to snowshoe hares. More recently Beard and Rous have established the experimental infection in snowshoe hares and in jack rabbits. We have observed many cases of the natural infection, and in Minnesota have found the condition to occur in more or less endemic areas. The occurrence of the tumors more conspicuously on the head and neck, and their discrete distribution on almost any part of the body, indicate insect or arthropod transmission.